[Sanford Levinson is a professor of law at the University of Texas. The
author of several articles on the Second Amendment, he is the author,
most recently, of Our Undemocratic Constitution: Where the Constitution
Goes Wrong (and How We the People Can Correct It).]

One can interpret today's decision in the Heller case from both"external" political perspectives or from a more"internal" legal one. I begin with the former: My own hope, which was spectacularly unrealized, was that the Supreme Court would unanimously accept the very well-written and -argued brief by the Solicitor General, in behalf of the Bush Administration, which argued both that the Second Amendment indeed protected an individual right to"keep and bear arms" and disagreed with the particularly rigorous test that the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia had applied to the D.C. ordinance. Thus, according to the Solicitor General, the Court should remand the case back to the court below for reconsideration under a proper, somewhat looser, standard that would still have easily supported invalidating the ordinance.

Unanimous acceptance of his sensible view might have helped to diminish at least some of the culture war that has been waged now for at least four decades between advocates of"gun rights" and"gun control," who have their own interests in demonizing their opponents. Instead, the Court fractured along an all-too-predictable 5-4 axis, with the five conservatives supporting the rights of gun owners and the four liberals (or, more accurately,"moderates") seemingly supporting the most extreme version of gun" control," which is outright prohibition. The Solicitor General also offered a way for the Court to make sure that gun control would not become a key issue in this year's presidential race. Now there is no avoiding it, though, as a partisan Democrat, I confess to being relieved that the dissenters did not prevail, for the upholding of the D.C. ordinance would, in effect, have served as a massive in-kind campaign contribution to John McCain.

Then there are the"internal" features of the opinions, more interesting, no doubt, to lawyers (and law professors) than to pundits, but not without their broader interest. One of the most remarkable features of Justice Scalia's majority opinion and Justice Stevens's dissent (joined by Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, and Souter) is the view that the Second Amendment means only what it meant at the time of its proposal and ratification in 1789-91. Thus they spend a total of 110 pages debating arcane aspects of the purported original meaning of the Amendment.

If one had any reason to believe that either Scalia or Stevens were a competent historian, then perhaps it would be worth reading the pages they write. But they are not. Both opinions are what is sometimes called"law-office history," in which each side engages in shamelessly (and shamefully) selective readings of the historical record in order to support what one strongly suspects are pre-determined positions. And both Scalia and Stevens treat each other -- and, presumably, their colleagues who signed each of the opinions -- with basic contempt, unable to accept the proposition, second nature to professional historians, that the historical record is complicated and, indeed, often contradictory. Justice Stevens, for example, writes that anyone who reads the text of the Second Amendment and its history, plus a murky 1939 decision of the Court, will find"a clear answer" to the question of whether the Second Amendment supports a"right to possess and use guns for nonmilitary purposes." This is simply foolish. Neither Scalia nor Stevens pays any real attention to a plethora of first-rate historical work written over the past decade that challenges this kind of foolish self-confidence.

What is especially ironic is that the strongest support for Scalia's position comes from acknowledging that the Second Amendment, like the rest of the Bill of Rights, has been"dynamically" interpreted and has taken on some quite different meanings from those it originally had. Whatever might have been the case in 1787 with regard the linkage of guns to service in militias -- and the historical record is far more mixed on this point than either Scalia or Stevens is willing to acknowledge -- there can be almost no doubt that by the mid-19th century, an individual right to bear arms was widely accepted as a basic attribute of American citizenship. One of the reasons that the Court in Dred Scott denied that blacks could be citizens was precisely that Chief Justice Taney recognized that citizens could carry guns, and it was basically unthinkable that blacks could do so. Thus, in effect, they could not be citizens. Charles Sumner, who, unlike Taney is quoted by Scalia, strongly endorsed the rights of anti-slavery settlers in Kansas to have guns to protect themselves against their pro-slavery opponents.

If one reads only Scalia and Stevens, one would believe that there is no dynamism to the Constitution, which is both stupid as a theory of interpretation and, more to the point, completely misleading as a way of understanding the American constitutional tradition.

All in all, a dismaying performance by the Supreme Court, whatever one thinks of the actual result.

More Comments:

David E. Young -
10/9/2008

The Heller decision does not present the history of the Second Amendment. Instead, it is a textual analysis of the amendment's language based on the historical meaning of the terms with a few historical examples thrown in. Very little of the Second Amendment's history can be determined from the Heller decision.

Those interested in finding out why there is so much confusion surrounding the Second Amendment and why so little is known about its actual history should read this HNN article:

Michael Davis -
6/30/2008

The old, senile Stevens' errors are:

"At p.2 of the Stevens dissent he refers to NFA and US v. Miller: "Upholding a conviction under that Act, this Court held that..."

Same mistake the 9th Circus made years ago and had to issue a new opinion, since Miller was never convicted -- commentators noted this was pretty suggestive the court hadn't bothered to read Miller before citing it. First thing you look for in reading a case is what happened below, and what the Court do to that. Very first thing.

I'd add that at 41 he refers to:

"In 1901 the President revitalized the militia by creating the 'National Guard of the several States,' Perpich 496 U.S. at 341 and nn. 9-10."

Reading that part of Perpich v. Dodd: It says in 1901 President Roosevelt called for reforming the militia. He didn't create the National Guard (where would he have had the authority?)

On the next page Perpich says that Congress in 1903 enacted the Dick Act, which created the "National Guard of the Several States." Footnote 11 of that opinion, referring to creation of the Guard, begins: "The Act of January 21, 1903, 32 Stat. 775, provided in part..." So I guess he didn't read the Perpich case, either, let alone verify the dates and who did what.

And none of the four signing onto this opinion, and none of their clerks, saw these items?"

· Parker v. DC

Michael Davis -
6/30/2008

Sanford, I wish you were so quick to protect the INDIVIDUAL right to keep and bear arms, as you are to protect the right to assemble, speak out, burn flags, etc, etc, ad infinitum.

As Robert verBruggen recently wrote, "Stevens's dissent is the more substantive, though it does contain some rather embarrassing factual errors. Stevens concedes the amendment "can be enforced by individuals" and "protects an individual right" before going on to argue around what he just theoretically conceded."

William J. Stepp -
6/29/2008

There is no book owners' equivalent of the second amendment, but if there were, it would read: "A well educated citizenry, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read Books, shall not be infringed." What the sentence means might be unclear, but what is clear is that it does not give a writ to the State to ban or restrict the owning of books. Yet the history of books in America contains a long and dark chapter of just such restrictions, and to what end? Certainly not educating the citizenry.

The same point can be made about the second amendment. It might be unclear, but it does not warrant restrictions on gun ownership. Yet the history of guns in America is replete with bans and lesser infringements, and to what end? Certainly neither regulating the militia, nor improving the safety of the citizenry.

Tim R. Furnish -
6/29/2008

A literal reading of the 2nd Amendment is "dismaying?" And what is the purpose of trotting out Sumner, except to somehow attempt to tar Scalia as guilty-by-association? Oh, and what is his rationale for the line that the four liberals on the SC should really be termed "moderates?" Because the author of this piece is so far left that they seem moderate to him? Weak case.